Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege to speak today to Bill C-63, an act respecting Canadian citizenship.
I am also one of the members of the Reform Party who are immigrants to Canada. I was not born in this country. I came as a child and at that time was unable to obtain Canadian citizenship until I reached my age of majority, as it was called. I remember one of the first things I did when I turned 21 was to apply to become a Canadian citizen. I took a great deal of pride in attending the ceremony in citizenship court and taking a very heartfelt oath of allegiance. I felt very proud of my status as a Canadian citizen. I am a Canadian by choice.
I married a man who was also an immigrant to Canada and a refugee from eastern Europe, as one might tell by my name. As a refugee and immigrant my husband Tom also took enormous pride in being a citizen of this country. As well, my sister married an immigrant from Nigeria.
The whole area of citizenship and immigration is one that is very near and dear to my family, to me personally and to me as a representative of Canada and Canadians and a representative of many immigrants to Canada from my riding of Calgary—Nose Hill.
My records show that over half of the case work that comes into my constituency office is related to the area of citizenship and immigration. I say to the parliamentary secretary opposite that the citizenship and immigration system is not working in the best interest of immigrants and of many new Canadians.
The bill is a bit like an analogy where the minister has inherited a vehicle which is very unreliable. It does not serve the people who hope to ride in it and be transported by it. It is a danger to them in some cases.
What does the minister do? The minister decides to fill up the windshield wiper fluid container. That is about what the bill does. We have a system which people in the House have pointed out to the government is not working. It is full of very unfair, unworkable, even dangerous provisions, lapses and anomalies. Yet the minister has chosen to bring in a bill that just does a bit of cosmetic change.
Members of the House are trying to point out to the government in a responsible and thoughtful way that there are many areas of our immigration and citizenship system which need substantive addressing. The government is well aware of this. Its own committee dominated by its own members made it clear in the past to the minister and to the government that substantial change and improvement were needed.
Yet the best the government can do is a shoddy attack on people who thoughtfully point out there needs to be a better service for Canadians, and particularly new Canadians, in the system of immigration and citizenship that is presently in place.
The government was elected in 1993. It was to make an overhaul of our social system and of our immigration and citizenship act. When any change is contemplated there is a study, a commission or committee set up to advise the government looking at the issues and advise the government as to changes that should be made. In fact that was done.
The Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration was asked by the minister to advise the government on how the system should be overhauled. The committee did its work. We must bear in mind that the committee was made up of a majority of government members. The recommendations from the committee were not just from the opposition but from government members. They released a very thoughtful report. It was called “Canadian Citizenship: A Sense of Belonging”.
The committee did its work with commendable timeliness. The government was elected in October 1993 and in June 1994 the committee released its report, having made some months of thoughtful study.
I ask the House to calculate the amount of time from June 1994 to the present, February 1999. I am sure even the parliamentary secretary will acknowledge the truth of my assertion that it took nearly five years for the minister to put any legislation before the House. It was five years, not from the time the government said it would make some needed improvements to the whole immigration and citizenship act, but from the time the study and recommendations were completed.
What do we find in the bill? The bottom line is that the bill does not address almost all the recommendations of its own Liberal dominated committee. I do not know where that work, that study, that consultation with Canadians and that examination of the issues went. I do not know what good it did. I do not know that the hours of thoughtful, earnest and sincere work by government and opposition members on this matter were of any use because most of what was in the report has simply been ignored. The bill goes its own way and refuses to address many of the issues raised by the committee.
It neglects some of the critical areas that need attention and alters other recommendations in a negative way. The government and the minister have much to answer for in ignoring the recommendations of members of the House on these important points and issues.
The bill fails to fix some of the mechanical difficulties and some of the safety issues of the immigration and citizenship vehicle and stops at filling up the windshield wiper container. That is about all the bill does.
Under clauses 31 and 32 of the bill the duties of current citizenship judges will be handed over to Citizenship and Immigration Canada departmental officials. The citizenship judges with whom I have had the privilege of being associated in the city of Calgary, and particularly Judge Ann Wilson, had nothing but the deepest respect in the immigrant and ethnic communities of our city. Judge Ann Wilson, who worked tirelessly to cultivate good relations and communications with groups that represented and were representative of new Canadians, had a heart of welcome and of good will for new Canadians.
It was a pleasure to attend her citizenship ceremonies where she presided. This tangible link between the minister, the minister's department and new Canadians will now be severed. However, the Liberals, although they got rid of the citizenship judges they did not appoint, want to have the ability to reward their good and faithful supporters so they have set up citizenship commissioners. We are not quite sure what the commissioners are going to do. We understand they are going to promote active citizenship in the community, whatever that means.
A very good institution has been done away with under this bill substituting other patronage appointments under the Liberals. Again, what is being served other than Liberal political priorities?
I hope the committee will be asking some very tough questions of the minister and the departmental officials about this bill when it comes before it. I could make a number of other criticisms about the bill. Unfortunately 10 minutes goes very quickly.
The committee study should point out some of the obvious flaws of this bill. I hope to speak to it again at third reading.